“ oh, little bit of this, lil’ bit of that. some of ‘em crawl inside ya, some of ‘em like to get you to drink somethin’ and make you forget what they did to ya. sort of a mind fuck when you wake up the next mornin’ with one mother of a headache, but relieved. like you’ve had a good fuck the night before. ” a solid, needy part of him is glad he has her full attention. as if it were the same belief he used to thrive on. there’s a sweet taste in his mouth, honey-like and thick. belief seemed to him always sugary. when the first bowl of milk had been set out for him, the ol’ granny had sprinkled in a bit of sugar cane. it made his teeth ache, but his bones stronger.
there had been something pure in her reaction. not the hungry look of greed most men and women have while he does his tricks. as if she’d been impressed not with the coin, but the act of producing it. he liked the way her eyes followed his fingers. and with the taste of sugar in his mouth, his grin widens. a hand moving to hover over her empty glass, “ oh, this? ” and suddenly a dozen or so of his coins pour themselves from his open palm into the glass. the sharp clink of each coin draws attention and a few eyes whirl in their direction. perhaps it hadn’t been too smart to advertise that the man could literally shit gold, but it was too much fun to watch her lips move in awe.
“ you may not be an elf from the motherland, but ya sure impress easy like one. ” he pulls a coin as if from behind her ear, pinched between his fingers and held in front of her.
Momo scrunched her nose at that. Oh— that didn’t sound fun at all. There wasn’t anything that she knew of that was truly comparable but… “Well, isn’t that a pain in the ass. No wonder you hate them— pleasant side-effect aside.” An image of a brightly-hued sprite danced behind her eyes, yanking her jaw down to force a potion through. She shook her head, ridding the image, replacing it with the tall man before her, a man who was becoming more intriguing by the minute. She’d be the first to admit she didn’t think much of the drunk who had angrily spouted…whatever it was at her, and her initial reaction had been far from kindness or any inclination to spare him more words. And yet here she was, eyes lingering longer with each glance.
She tilted her head, something like a smile pulling at her lips. “Can’t say I know anything like that. Except demons, though they’re limited to tempting mages. Which I am not.” It was freeing, somehow, to speak of such things with a stranger. She wouldn’t deny that his bluntness, laced with a familiar dirty tone that reminded her so much of the attitude of her home.
She watched in awe as the coins spilled from his palm, an act so simple yet so entrancing. Her smile stretched wide across her face, eyebrows pulled up; she felt like a girl again, watching their Keeper send sparks of electricity into the air to add effect to a campfire story. She laughed, almost giddy when he ‘pulled’ one from behind her ear. “I can’t help it— that is impressive. I guess that’s the first thing your elves and I have in common. Besides the ears, of course. Have you always been able to do that?”
